Just found a blog written by Andrew Clay about every British feature film released in the UK in 2009. He tried to see as many as he could in the East Midlands, where he lives. As Andrew points out, 90 Brit flicks were theatrically released this year, or 20% of all films, but even though he was paying attention, it was hard to find out about them – few were significantly promoted, watched, or made money. Be great to map this study against DVD releases, windows, and films for download both legal and illegal – Andrew, can you?
In my view we can extend the reach of these films by closing all the windows and making one piece of marketing for one day and date release – theatric, online, DVD. Has anyone got good stats about when this has happened? How long before we don’t need a theatric to get the press and marketing that films need? I admire the work of Gigantic Digital to make this happen, with films like Must Read After My Death - getting press across the State for a New York only theatric release. More of this please.
#1 written by Andrew Clay December 30th, 2009 at 13:02
Nick, thanks for the interest shown in my blog. I will be continuing the blog next year. The database of 90 films is now established, but as you suggest, there are still things that can be addressed such as analysing patterns of release and platform availability and so on. I am massively behing with my logs of films that I have seen in the cinema and now the emphasis is on trying to see the films I haven’t seen anyway that I can. I just hit film number 51 by watching Summer Scars online at Lovefilm.com – so 39 more to go. This will be the focus of my blog for the next few weeks and also starting to analyse the films in more detail too. Nice to make contact with you. Cheers, Andrew.
#2 written by nick January 3rd, 2010 at 17:36
that’s great to hear Andrew; and are you in touch with the UK Film Council? Nick